4 March 2013

Lux

The Nordic summer has unique qualities that are difficult to explain. After long, dark winters, the world opens up and the light embraces you. You are giddy. The light is the defining factor. Light illumination is measured in units called Lux.

On a moonless, overcast night you get about 0.0001 lux. The lighting in an average family living room is about 50 lux. The Nordic winter - overcast, snow, rain and with a sunset, in Copenhagen anyway, at around 15:30 in mid-December - is not generous in it's distribution of lux. Rarely does it rise above about 400 lux.

On a sunny, summer's day, on the other hand, your body and mind is splashed with upwards of 100,000 lux. What a shock in the first sunny days of spring. It triggers that feeling of a rush and it increases your energy levels and even your sexual desire. It's quite a difference between winter and summer. I love the Copenhagen summer, needless to say.

Copenhageners at a stop light near the city hall square, on the bike lane.

Not quite as dramatic in Vancouver, Canada, but we're still a northern city with a grey and dreary winter (and spring, and fall) and a sunny and brilliant summer.

Bike traffic has been going up, and on a beautiful sunny day like today, I cross paths with 30 or 40 cyclists on my short 8 minute commute. Some are skinny guys in spandex on racing bikes, but most are just normal people wearing normal clothes, on their way to work too. We're working on it.

Your post reminds me of last summer when I was in Stockholm. I kept getting up at different intervals throughout the night to take pictures of the sky and what you call Lux. We don't really experience this phenomenon here on the 37th parallel.